Cakes are batter-based baked products prepared with three major ingredients present in different ratios depending on the type of cake: flour, sugar and eggs (whole eggs and/or egg white and/or egg yolk). Additional ingredients may be for example fats and/or lipids, leavening agents, emulsifiers, milk proteins, hydrocolloids, starch (native, chemically or physically modified), cocoa powder, chocolate, coloring agents, flavors, etc. Cakes may be leavened due to addition of ingredients (ex. baking powder, egg, emulsifier, protein, . . . ) and/or due to the cake preparation process (ex. whipping of the batter). Typical types of cakes are loaf cream and pound cakes, cup cream and pound cakes, sponge cakes, muffins, cake donuts, brownies, etc.
Cake staling is a phenomenon that occurs during storage. Cake staling (also referred as loss of freshness) is a combination of the deterioration of different texture parameters of the cake among which loss of softness, loss of moistness, loss of cohesiveness, increased gumminess and loss of resilience.
The softness of a cake is the feeling related to the force required to compress and bite the cake crumb. Cake moistness is the moist sensation (opposite of dryness) perceived when touching and eating the cake. Touching a moist cake with the lips and/or the hands gives a colder sensation on lips and/or compared to a dry cake. In the mouth a moist cake is felt as humid and juicy. When eating a moist cake, there is no feeling that it absorbs water from the inside of the mouth. Softness and moistness in cakes are different parameters. For example, traditional sponge cakes are very soft, though they are perceived as not moist (very dry). On the other hand, some brownies can be perceived as very moist and yet be hard and dense. Moisture migration from crumb to crust and amylopectin retrogradation are identified as the main causes of cake firming and cake drying during storage.
Various solutions have been proposed to retard the negative evolution of the texture of cakes during prolonged storage. Among these are special types of emulsifiers, fats, sugars, gums and hydrocolloids. Enzymes such as alpha-amylases have also been described. Amylases do hydrolyse the starch fraction in cake and reduce amylopectin retrogradation during storage. However too extensive hydrolysis of starch using non-specific or too aggressive amylases can negatively influence the volume and the shape of the cake resulting in e.g. the collapse of the cake and/or the cake having inferior cake texture properties.
WO 2006/032281 describes the anti-staling effect in cake of a maltogenic alpha-amylase active in high sugar concentrations. Also, methods to produce cakes wherein the cake batter comprises a lipolytic enzyme and an anti-staling amylase have been tried. All these enzymes or enzymes combinations have mainly an effect on the softness of the cakes. Attempts to further increase the freshness by adding increased amounts of enzymes lead to cakes having the tendency to become perceived as more chewy or harder. Also for bread products different types of enzymes have been added in order to try to increase the softness of the bread products. However, there is an important difference between bread product recipes and cake product recipes. Bread doughs are typically yeast leavened (and may comprise eggs, sugar and/or fat in low amounts) or chemically leavened (typically not comprising eggs, sugar and/or fat), whereas cake batters comprise eggs, sugar and fat in larger amounts and optionally comprise chemical leavening agents. Due to the differences in recipes and chemical processes between bread doughs and cake batters, effects obtained for bread doughs recipes are usually not valid for cake batter recipes.
Today consumers are looking for cakes with improved and/or prolonged freshness that have simultaneously improved or at least conserved/maintained texture properties (cohesiveness and resilience) in order to resist manipulations like packaging, slicing and decorating. There is therefore a need for new and improved cake recipes.
The present invention solves the problems indicated above by providing cake products having improved and/or prolonged freshness, while still maintaining the quality and organoleptic properties of the cake product, including the texture.